Slings and Arrows
by Alexandra Spar
Summary: Post GoF. Narcissa Malfoy reveals something rather earth-shaking to her son. How will Draco reconcile his new understanding of his family with all that he has been taught to believe?
1. Another day, another Death Eater brunch

This story has OBVIOUS parallels with one of Shakespeare's plays. 

Disclaimer: this story is based on characters and situations owned by JK Rowling and various publishers and Warner Bros. Inc. No copyright infringement is intended and no money is being made. I also have no claim on Shakespeare.

This was written as the beginning of a story I've been thinking about for weeks now. More will be forthcoming shortly, only I've got to go to bed now.

"Draco? Draco, wake up."

_Mother's voice. Quiet, for her, but still as sharp and impatient as ever._

"Draco. Wake up."

_Must be morning. Funny. Doesn't feel like it._

He opened his eyes, slowly, found himself staring at the underside of the green silk canopy, emblazoned with the black-and-silver Malfoy crest: a sword, half black and half silver, on a reversed silver and black ground. The words _Superbia, Scientia, Fidelis_ stared back at him. Slowly he transferred his gaze down to his mother's face, bending over him. Her makeup was, as ever, irreproachable, her platinum hair firmly held in a complicated prison of curls and braids that resembled nothing so much as a nest of white worms. "Draco," she said. "Your father's guests will be here shortly. He wishes you to attend them."

"Do I have to?"

"Yes." She got up, charcoal velvet robes falling perfectly into Renaissance folds. "He wants to show off your excellent manners and breeding."

"Can't imagine why." Draco yawned hugely and sat up, running hands through his hair. "Who's going to be there?"

"MacNair, Nott, the Lestranges' heir, possibly some of the Russians. Do make an effort to be presentable, Draco." 

He slithered out of bed. "I take it you want me to wear the official Malfoy robes?"

Narcissa was silent for a moment, and he turned to look at her. The expression on her statue's features was so out of character that he felt his knees go briefly weak. She looked...sorry. Sorry, and unhappy, and as if she wished she didn't have to go through this.

"Yes," she said simply. "And be good."

_Ah, yes. Good. Be good. Take Lucius's gibes with becoming self-deprecation and suck it up. _He knew what being "good" meant.

"Yes, Mother."

She left, and he was alone with the luxurious barrenness of his room, and the wardrobe full of designer robes that cost more than an entire year's tuition at Hogwarts per square yard. Right.

He sighed, walked over to the washbasin and splashed frigid water on his face. The shock brought him halfway to wakefulness, but he still felt logy and overtired as he flipped back the sodden hair from his face and pulled open the wardrobe, staring at the serried ranks of velvets and silks. The Malfoy dress robes were complicated and multilayered and thoroughly uncomfortable, and the high collar made him look like a vicar. Nevertheless, he dressed as hurriedly as he could, and found himself staring at his reflection in the antique cheval glass with some admiration. He looked, vestment-collar aside, rather like a young angel in a Caravaggio painting. 

_How nice. Maybe that'll placate Lucius enough to avoid a beating. I'm still sore from last week._

He ran a comb through the colorless hair, a legacy from the veela ancestors several generations back, and scowled fiercely at his reflection. _That's going to have to do._

Draco Malfoy left his chambers.

Lucius Malfoy's little impromptu _salons_ were well-known in the Death Eater society as a mark of distinction; to have garnered an invitation to one of these gatherings was to have achieved a kind of ascendancy among one's fellow Silver Serpents. When Draco got down to the parlour, MacNair and Nott were already there, and Lucius, ensconced in his favourite thronelike chair, was already holding court. _Christ. I wonder how long this is going to take. I've got sleep to catch up on, and about seven essays for Snape I need to do before much longer. He's been as lenient with me as he can. _

"Ah, Draco," said Lucius, absently. Draco knew better than to take that tone at face value. The more absent Lucius sounded, the more attentive he was being to the situation. He had the dangerous vague look on his lovely features too. Draco's heart thumped uncomfortably. _Wonder what he's planning._

"Father," said Draco, in the subservient tones he'd been painfully taught.

"Come in, come in, my boy. Take a seat. MacNair was telling me about a fascinating new curse he's been working on. Do continue, MacNair."

Draco subsided onto the end of a couch, folding his hands decorously on his lap and trying to look interested. Screwing with Potty and Weasel and the rest of them at school was one thing; there he had absolute autonomy over the actions of most of Slytherin House. Here, at "home," he was as much a prisoner as their house-elves, although a better-dressed one. He marshalled his features into an expression of polite interest at what MacNair was describing, which was extremely explicit and involved the structural integrity of the typical human liver. 

"You could've done with that one last time you and Potter had a duel," drawled Lucius. Draco stiffened. His father was alluding to the incident on the school train at the end of last term, when he and his thugs had been attacked from at least three directions by hexes, and had spent the entire trip back unconscious on the corridor floor. There had been choice words from Lucius about that. Words, and actions. He shifted uncomfortably on the couch, aware of the heaviness of the robes on the new scars over his back and chest.

"Yes, Father."

"Interesting," Lucius continued. "I hadn't thought the lobes would have that much consistency. What about the spleen, MacNair? I've always been fond of the spleen."

"Well, that's a different story," said MacNair, swelling with pride. "If I might say so, our experiments have proven that the human spleen can withstand astonishing amounts of trauma. The trick is to do it slowly and evenly, so that the natural processes of regeneration and healing have a chance to begin."

"Indeed," said Lucius. "Ah, Avdotya, please, take a seat. Cognac?"

Draco recognized the dark-haired woman who'd just joined the group as another of the most favoured Death Eaters, an ex-associate of Igor Karkaroff and a professor at Durmstrang. He was unable to suppress a small shudder at the thought of how close he'd come to attending Durmstrang rather than Hogwarts. It had been rather a nice idea at the beginning of term, with Potter and his little Army of Light giving off annoying waves of wholesomeness; however, with the events of the year and the astonishing reality of Diggory's death at the hands of his father and the other Death Eaters, Draco's entire view of the world had become somewhat skewed. He wasn't at all sure he wanted to be a Death Eater anymore, but he knew damn well that trying to back out of it at this point was tantamount to telling his father to go and screw himself, and he knew suicide when he saw it. Oh, yes, he knew suicide.

Avdotya Ryubova sat down, accepted a glass of brandy. "Ah, Lucius," she said musically. "This is the boy?" Draco was aware of her eyes on him, and tried to look less conspicuous, which wasn't easy under several yards of green and black brocade. 

"Indeed," said Lucius. "Draco, meet Avdotya Vasilievna Ryubova. Avdotya, this is my son Draco." 

Draco got up, swept the Death Eater a complicated bow he'd been taught at the age of eight. "My lady."

"Charming," said Avdotya to Lucius. "He's just like you. Give him five years and he'll be breaking hearts just as you did."

"Ah, weren't those the days?" said Lucius, with no humour in his glacial eyes. "Draco, leave us. We must discuss business."

He fled.


	2. Revelations

Slings and Arrows part 2

Draco reached the relative safety of the green drawing room on the second floor, and caught his breath. He was used to the presence of Death Eaters in the house, but the woman Ryubova had seemed to give off waves of cold like an opened freezer, and he didn't like the calculating look in Lucius's icy eyes at all. _Something is up. I wish I knew what._

He knew they'd summon him when the meal was served; they always did. If Lucius happened to be in a magnanimous mood, he might allow Draco to stay with the adults while he plied them with aperitifs, but Draco had a feeling the meeting Lucius was holding now had nothing to do with magnanimity, and everything to do with the destruction of the Potter boy. It had only been a few weeks since the Hogwarts spring term had ended, and already Harry Potter's precious life was being threatened once again. _Just once,_ thought Draco sourly, _just once, would it be too much to ask to have a simple and uncomplicated summer vacation without my father trying to have someone killed? _

He sighed, wandered over to the vast green marble chimney-breast. Over the mantel hung an enormous eighteenth-century portrait of a Malfoy in complicated robes that recalled some of the costumes he'd seen in _Amadeus_. A gilt scroll beneath the painting announced that it immortalized one Guillaume Auguste de Malfoy, Comte de Lusigne et Courolles. Draco tipped his head on one side, regarding the Comte with narrowed eyes. It was astonishing how much the Malfoys looked like one another. Guillaume could have been Lucius, in a long white curly wig.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you it's not polite to stare?" inquired the portrait, in an upper-class French accent. Draco jumped.

"Sorry," he said, without thinking. "Er. I didn't know you...."

"Noticed? Honestly, boy, what else is there to do? I'm stuck in this ghastly frame with an abysmal view of a tiny room. Into which, I might add, no one ever comes, so I have very little to entertain myself with." He sounded petulant.

"How boring for you," said Draco, trying to mollify his ancestor. Guillaume looked slightly less peeved.

"Well, at least you have _some _manners," he said, consideringly. "You'll be Julian's son, I daresay?"

"Lucius's, actually," said Draco. "Lucius and Narcissa."

The portrait frowned. "_Lucius_ and Narcissa? Hmmm. I'm _sure_ that's not the pairing I recall."

"What do you mean?" Draco asked, idly. Guillaume fixed him with a familiar grey stare. 

"I'm probably wrong. Out of touch, you know. What's your name, boy?"

"Draco."

Now Guillaume did look surprised, and rather nonplussed. "_Draco?_ Well...I suppose..."

"I know, I know," said Draco, "it's a ridiculous name. Trust me, I get enough of that at school."

"It's a fine name, boy. An old Malfoy name. Don't interrumpt your elders." He appeared to be thinking. Draco took a few steps back and stared at him. "Must be coincidence."

"What must be coincidence?" he asked, genuinely curious by now.

"Well...." said Guillaume. "If you don't know about it already....it's really not my place to tell you. Your mother ought to have done so a while ago."

"What on earth are you talking about?" Draco demanded, the Malfoy imperiousness rising in him like boiling milk. "Stop hinting about things."

Guillaume laughed, a little dry sound. "I'm glad to see the family spirit hasn't died out. Look....Draco...if you want to know....I suggest you find yourself in the Oak Room at midnight tonight. It's the anniversary, so the manifestation will be stronger than ever."

Draco leaned closer. "What manifestation?"

"You'll see," said his ancestor mysteriously. "Although you may not like what you see. No, you won't like it at all..." He trailed off, looking distant. "You're wanted in the dining room. Best be off, boy, it's not the thing to keep one's elders and betters waiting."

Draco knew that better than most. He didn't hesitate, but as he left he couldn't help wondering just what the wretched portrait had _meant_ by all of those vague remarks. _Manifestation of what? What should Mother have told me?_

Nevertheless, he decided to make a midnight reconnaissance journey to the disused Oak Room at the top of the north wing. No point ignoring something that weird. It might, after all, be some sort of distraction from the crap his father clearly intended to put him through that summer.

Dinner was, as ever, a fraught affair. Draco took his place halfway down the vast ebony table, glittering with crystal and silver and Crown Derby, and did his best to stay out of the conversation and look obedient. Branson the butler kept refilling his wineglass, and the looks Lucius kept shooting him said very clearly that he was to drink the stuff and enjoy it like a man. He couldn't remember all the times Lucius had told him that the appreciation of good wine was one of the characteristics of a gentleman, but he had never much liked it; it made him feel dizzy and rather sick. He concentrated on eating, and speaking only when spoken to.

"...and so I believe that once the furor dies down we will be able to replace Karkaroff with someone a little more worthy," Bartleby Lestrange was saying, gesturing with a glassful of Chateau d'Yquem. "The mess with the Goblet of Fire was hardly appropriate, but it did accelerate things a bit."

"Our Lord is growing stronger by the day," said Ryubova throatily. "We must tighten our ranks in support. What are we going to do about the traitor Snape?"

Draco choked, loudly. Lucius gave him a furious glare—_have you learned nothing about table manners, boy?_—but Ryubova leaned over and thwacked him firmly on the back. "Are you all right?" she asked, not unkindly. He nodded, red with embarrassment and coughing, and took the glass of water Lestrange handed him. Lucius made an exasperated noise.

"Draco, if you can't behave properly at the table I shall send you to your room," he said coldly. _Oh, if only you would_, thought Draco. "What were you saying, Avdotya?"

"Oh, just that the man Snape continues to live," she said lightly. "He betrayed our Master, and yet he continues to live. Surely that is not as it should be?"

"I rather think Our Lord enjoys keeping him around," said Nott through a mouthful of filet mignon. "As a plaything, you know. The number of times I've seen Snape subjected to Crucio....it's rather astonishing how long he _has_ survived, actually. I expect he would be dead if Our Lord had wished him to be." Draco, still coughing a bit, tried not to think about all the times Snape had dragged himself to morning Potions looking as if someone had been using him as a Bludger bat, and directed his attention firmly at the plate in front of him.

Ryubova laughed musically. "I bow to your superior knowledge, Nott," she said. "What about the chapters of the Silver Serpent in other countries? I can vouch for Russia and Ukraine."

"We're solid all through Western Europe," MacNair said. "By the way, Lucius, this is an excellent year." He swirled the pale-golden wine in his glass. "You never cease to surprise me with your taste."

Lucius inclined his head slightly in acceptance of the compliment. "Which reminds me," he said, "there are several openings in my, ah, business network. If any of you have recommendations for new hires, I'd be glad to hear them." The talk moved to Lucius's extensive web of shipping connections and the multiple smuggling rings those connections had been set up to camouflage. Draco managed to keep from incurring his father's wrath throughout the rest of the meal, until the plates had been cleared away and coffee, brandy and cigars brought in. _Snape_, he thought painfully. _Not that I like the man much, but he's never been unfair to me. Just unfair to everyone else. I knew he had been a Death Eater, but I didn't know about Voldemort's using him for curse target practice. Nobody deserves that. Nobody._

Christ. It's getting worse. And more impossible to back out of.

He didn't look up as the brandy decanter passed. "Draco!" snapped Lucius. "You will drink with the rest of us. Branson, pour it."

Draco sighed, watched the snifter fill with amber liquid. He already felt sick from the wine during dinner and from choking. This wasn't going to help. Fixing the Malfoy smile on his face, he raised his glass in a toast with the other guests. "To Our Dark Lord's rising," he chorused, and managed to keep the smile from turning into a grimace. He stole a glance at his mother, down at the other end of the table. She looked rather white, and he noticed her hand was trembling around the stem of the glass. _I wonder what's eating her._

"To you, Lucius," Nott was saying, raising his glass again. Obediently Draco followed suit. There were three or four more toasts before the conversation drifted back to desultory things like the rising percentages of Mudbloods in positions of influence in Britain, and the brandy fumes were making his head swim. He did his best to remain inconspicuous, but inevitably the conversation returned to the topic of Harry Potter, as it always did eventually, and the attention of the table gravitated to him. He swallowed, feeling worse.

"What was the reaction to Diggory's death?" asked MacNair importantly. "I trust you did your best to blame Potter for that, Draco?"

"Yes, sir," he said automatically. "I suggested that Potter dragged Diggory with him when the Portkey activated, out of cowardice, and this caused Diggory's death."

"And?"

"I was believed by most people, I think," Draco lied. "Potter's adherents are blind to any other arguments but their own, though. They'd not believe me if I told them the sky was blue."

"A pity you did not try harder," said Lucius coldly. "And I hardly need to remind you of the incident on the train."

Draco looked down, furious at the blush that was rising in his face. "Yes, Father."

"Oh, don't be so hard on him, Lucius," said Ryubova absently. "He's just a boy."

_Just a boy, indeed._ "A boy who must learn," Lucius corrected. "Draco, drink your brandy."

He did, slowly, trying not to gag. When the glass was empty he set it down and marshalled his features into the Malfoy mask. "May I be excused from the table, Father?"Lucius's eyes got colder, if that was possible. "I am constantly amazed," he said, cutting off the words, "by your lack of manners, Draco. You are fifteen years old, and yet you continue to insist on acting like a spoilt child. No, you may not be excused until our guests have finished."

"Oh, come on, Lucius," said Lestrange, who was rather flushed with alcohol. "Give the kid a break."

Lucius turned that wintry gaze on him, and some of the flush left his face. Draco shot a glance down the table to his mother. He was rather afraid he'd be sick soon, and he really didn't want to know what Lucius would do to him if he did that in front of guests. Narcissa caught the look, and Draco was surprised to see how agitated she was. _What's wrong with her?_ he thought. _Before, she just looked uncomfortable; now she looks frightened. And sad._

"Let him go, my love," she said quietly, "please? He's been working terribly hard on his studies; he's overtired."

A look of absolute and utter fury flickered on Lucius's lovely features for a moment, before being replaced by a rather brittle and mirthless smile. "Very well, Narcissa," he said evenly. "You may go, Draco. I will see you in my study at ten o'clock exactly."

_Great. More of the horsewhip. Or maybe he's got a new toy? Something with spikes on, perhaps?_ Before Lucius could change his mind, Draco rose and bowed to the guests, muttered an apology, and hurried out of the room, feeling sicker than ever.

A few minutes later, as he leaned over the toilet in his green-marble bathroom being ill, Draco wondered what on earth he was going to do. There wasn't anyone to talk to about any of this. His mother was as unapproachable as the ice statue she resembled; none of the servants or house-elves would let themselves hear anything he said in confidence because of the certainty that Lucius could, and would, torture it out of them. All he had was a dog-eared journal and the portrait of the Victorian Malfoys that hung over his fireplace across from his bed, with whom he'd had several conversations since the holidays began.

His retching eased, finally. _Damn Lucius. He knows perfectly well I can't hold liquor, and he continues to insist on getting me drunk every time I have to go to one of his little soirees. He must really like making me sick._

_Well, of course he does,_ he told himself. _He's a sadist. Unfortunately, he's also my father._

A new thought struck him. _What if he does the same stuff to Mother that he does to me? It's okay when it's just me....I'm used to it....but if he's hurting Mother, too...if that's why she looked so worried and distant....._

Well, then what? I can't do anything about it. Christ, and Potter thinks his_life is hard. At least his parents are dead. They can't talk to him up close with a whip._

Draco got up, shakily, washed out his mouth. _Shut up, Malfoy_, he told himself. _No use whingeing about it._ He splashed water on his face, staring at himself in the great mirror. He looked like hell. His pointed face was too pale (and still slightly greenish); his eyes were bloodshot and circled by brownish shadows. _I'm letting the side down. Malfoys are supposed to be ethereally beautiful._

Maybe I'd be ethereally beautiful if he'd stop beating the crap out of me and ease up on the all-night magic lessons. He gave himself a tired grin and lurched off towards the bed, collapsed face-down on the tangle of covers, and drifted into exhausted sleep.

"Master Draco, Master Draco," someone was saying, shrilly. "Master Draco must wake up now."

He rolled over and jerked entirely awake at the shock of finding himself face-to-face with a house-elf. "Gaah," he mumbled. "What time is it?"

"Nine-thirty. Master Draco must go to Master Lucius's study at ten," the house-elf squeaked, clearly terrified. "Master Draco mustn't be late."

He sat up sharply. "No he mustn't," he agreed, sliding out of bed. "Thanks....er...."

"Melly, Master Draco," said the house-elf, looking down. He realized he'd never ever thanked a house-elf before. "Melly has seen Master Draco's wounds, sir. Melly knows Master Lucius doesn't like to be kept waiting."

Draco stared at the creature. "You what?" he asked.

Melly squeaked. "Nothing, Master Draco. Forgive stupid Melly."

"No, what did you say," he demanded. "You've seen what exactly?"

"Master Draco's back," the house-elf managed through teeth chattering with fear. "When Melly is making the beds last week and Master Draco returns from the study, Master Draco is not seeing Melly and is taking off his shirt, and Melly is leaving, but in the mirror Melly sees the wounds." She was shaking so hard her pillowcase uniform was in danger of coming off. Draco sighed. This was the last thing he needed.

"Never mind," he said. "Go away now, Melly, and bring me some tea." He was still wearing the horrible dress robes, and as the elf scurried out of the room he weighed the benefits of changing with the advantages of keeping them on. The fabric was so thick it might ease the effects of the whip a bit, but that was likely to infuriate Lucius still further, and that might mean he would either make Draco strip entirely or just whip him for longer. Besides, the sight of the robes might recall the earlier confrontation, and he wasn't sure he wanted to do that. 

He stalked over to his wardrobe and pulled out a pair of black dress pants and a plain black shirt (white bloodstained too badly) and got changed as quickly as he could. Melly was back with a tea tray as he ran a comb through his silver hair, and he thanked her again. Funny; he'd never really considered the house-elves before, but this one had just saved him from sleeping through one of his father's appointments, and he had to admit that was a big, big favour. She squeaked and ran off as fast as her little legs could take her. _My charm seems to be losing its touch, too. I wonder what's happening to me?_

He drank his scalding tea and ate a handful of biscuits—_gotta keep the strength up, old boy_—before pulling a cloak around his shoulders and hurrying downstairs to his father's private study. 

An hour later he returned, limping a bit, and nearly fell over when he saw his mother standing in the doorway of his room. Narcissa looked as if she'd been _crying_. He hadn't actually known it was possible for her to cry. Tendrils of her hair were coming down, and her eyeliner was smudged a bit on one side. She looked human. It was a surprising change.

"Mother," said Draco tiredly. "To what do I owe the honor of this visit?"

"Sit down," she said, and pointed to the edge of the bed. She was using her authoritative voice, despite her disheveled appearance, and he found himself doing as she said. She pulled off his cloak and drew in a sharp, painful breath at the sight of the bloody tatters of his shirt. 

"Mother?" he said.

"Shut up and let me work." Behind him, she got up and went over to his dressing table, where—he noticed—she'd already laid out a bowl of hot water and some rolls of bandaging. _She knows. How long? Is he doing it to her too?_

Narcissa soaked a cloth in the water and began cleaning away the blood that oozed from the new welts. Draco hissed in pain, and he felt her hands pause, but continue working. "I'm sorry," he muttered.

"For what?" 

"The shirt. It was rather a good shirt. I should've picked something less expensive to wear."

Narcissa's breath shuddered. "Draco, don't talk to me just now. I need to concentrate." She worked quickly and gently, with the skill of long practice, and Draco found himself wondering how many times she'd done this, and why. When all the wounds were clean, she drew out her wand and tapped his back several times, muttering something; there was an instant of incredible pain, but then the agony died away to a dull itching ache. She began to bandage the wounds, slowly. "I'm afraid I can't heal them completely," she said, "but I've taken out the poison he puts on the whip. It makes the wounds scar badly and hurt more than they should. You'll be all right in a few days."

Draco turned and stared at her. She looked white and worn and very, very sad. "Mother," he said. "What's going on? Why are you so...." he trailed off, trying to find a tactful way to say it.

"So concerned about your welfare?" she said bitterly. "Don't thank me yet. You haven't heard the most important thing."

"Which is?"

"You spoke with Guillaume de Malfoy today, didn't you," she said, not really changing the subject. "He told you that you should go to the Oak Room tonight at midnight."

"Yes," said Draco, "but how did you know? I mean, what is all this mysterious crap? I'm tired of not being told anything."

"I know," she said softly. "I should have told you ages ago, Draco. I'm sorry. You deserved to know before now."

"Know _what_?" he demanded irritably. 

"Lucius Malfoy is not your father."

His room was utterly silent except for the crackle of the fire in the marble fireplace. Narcissa's eyes, violet-blue, were full of unshed tears as she looked at him searchingly. He knew his mouth was hanging open like a goldfish's. "But," he said at last. "But. I look just like him. He has to be my father, he has to be...."

"Lucius is your uncle. Your real father's name was Julian Malfoy; he was Lucius's twin brother."

"Was?" queried Draco, still rather dizzy with shock. Anger was beginning to make itself known, too.

"Julian died the year after you were born. It was never really explained how he died." She looked away, and he heard the tightness in her voice that meant the tears were threatening more fiercely. "Lucius...well, he was there for me. I was mad with grief, and terrified. Julian hadn't had any money, he'd been the younger of the two by about a minute, and therefore Lucius got everything by primogeniture. It was Lucius who'd supported us until Julian got a job. I was a widow at twenty-three, with a young child and about three Sickles to my name. Lucius stepped in and saved us from bankruptcy." She stopped, ran a hand through the tangled mess of her hair. Draco felt oddly light and calm, as if he wasn't really hearing this, as if he wasn't even really in his room. Shock and hate and anger swirled around him, but he felt quite distant and untouched by them. 

"So you married your dead husband's brother," he said. "How soon after my dad died?"

She wouldn't look at him. "About a month."

Oh, but now the anger was there, and it was powerful, and the room seemed to dim with redness as he felt his hands curl into fists with the rage. "A _month_," he spat. "_A month_?"

"_He was so like him!_" Narcissa hissed, turning like a snake to stare at him with her burning eyes. "So like Julian, back then. It was as if I could have Julian back again."

"Go on," said Draco levelly. "And what's this about you being penniless? I thought you were supposed to be from a rich pureblood family. _Lucius_ wouldn't have touched you otherwise."

"Is that what he told you?" she said, almost sadly. "My family were purebloods, certainly. But we had sold every single asset we'd ever had, over the years. Pride may be comforting, but it doesn't feed anybody. Julian married me despite my lack of a dowry. Lucius married me because he wanted it all for himself. He couldn't stand it when Julian and I got married. He couldn't stand his brother having anything he didn't. So when Julian....died, Lucius got his chance. 

"Draco....I know you hate me right now, and you've got every right to. I should never have concealed it from you. But it wasn't all in my hands, and it wasn't always like it is now. Lucius changed over the years. When we married, he wasn't...cruel. Not so cruel. He grew steadily colder and colder and more and more obsessed with perfection. He wanted you to be perfect. He wanted you to be his creation."

"Well, I'm not," spat Draco, getting up. "Mother....how could you? How _could_ you lie to me, all my life? How could you let me believe that sadistic bastard is my _father_? Look....just go, would you? Get out of my room. I don't want to see your face right now."

"I understand," said Narcissa quietly, and got to her feet. "Have a care, Draco. He is dangerous. He is a dangerous man."

"Get the fuck out of my room," Draco repeated, his voice beginning to crack as he lost the battle for control. 

TBC when I have time and energy. Vita Lab is on a brief hiatus because of skool work.

"Ryubova" is pronounced "Ree-YOU-bova."


	3. O, my prophetic soul, mine uncle

Slings and Arrows 3

standard disclaimer applies again (this goes for chapter 2 as well): Harry Potter and related indicia belong to JK Rowling, various publishers and Warner Bros. No copyright infringement intended, no money being made. Also no ownership of anything Shakespearean is professed herein. 

After Narcissa had left, holding herself so carefully straight that Draco knew instinctively she was trying not to cry, he had spent some time pacing helplessly up and down the green carpet, unable to deal with what he'd just heard. Lucius, his _uncle_? His _uncle_? All those speeches about living up to his father's shining example, based on a lie?

He felt as if his entire world had come loose from its moorings and was shaking itself to pieces. The only thing he could be sure of was that Lucius wouldn't stop at a beating if he knew Draco had found out about his real father. Lucius wouldn't stop, period. And Narcissa was in danger, too. He'd seen the looks his fa....his _uncle_ had been shooting her. He knew she was probably hiding the same silver-white whip scars that criscrossed his own back. And she was Lucius's wife, to do with as he pleased. She had even less protection than he did.

The clock on the mantel struck half twelve. He jerked out of his thoughts, aware of the pain that still shivered all up and down his back. _Guillaume said to be in the Oak Room tonight at twelve_, he thought. _I wonder what he wanted me to see._

Surely this is the secret he was talking about. All that crap about him being wrong and the Lucius-Narcissa pairing must be to do with this. I think he even mentioned Julian in there. 

Christ. 

Maybe I'll see something that will help.

He doubted it, doubted it very strongly indeed, but there was no other way to satisfy his curiosity than to follow the portrait's instructions. Outside the wind was rising and rain spattered against the great windows. _A fitting night for a "manifestation," _thought Draco sourly. _Now all we need is the organ music and the thunder and lightning, and I'm living the Hammer film life. _

For the first time in his life, Draco Malfoy envied Harry Potter.

The Oak Room was on the top floor of the mansion. Panelled in the dark wood that gave it its name, it was rarely used by the Malfoys due to its inconvenient location and the general feeling of unpleasantness that suffused its shadows. Draco shivered under his velvet dressing gown as he shone his wandlight into the corners of the room. It didn't feel welcoming at all, despite the squashy armchairs that sat under their dustcovers by the cold fireplace. It felt like he wasn't quite alone, and whatever was accompanying him didn't like the company one bit.

He jumped as somewhere a clock struck midnight. _Right,_ he thought shakily. _Manifest, then, if you're going to. I've not got all night._

He looked around himself, eyes wide in the dimness. Old portraits of more Malfoys and dark-varnished Gothic landscapes stared back at him. It suddenly seemed very, very dark in the room, and Draco found himself wishing heartily he was back in his own chambers, warm and brightly lit. _I'm giving this one more minute,_ he thought, _then I'm out of here. And screw Guillaume de Malfoy. _

There was a breath of coldness in the closed air of the room. Draco turned slowly, aware that the air was moving from behind him. He felt the blood drain out of his face, felt his heart jump and stutter as slowly the darkness began to take on a faint form, like a moving shadow.

_Christ._

The thing, whatever it was, was giving off coldness like an odor. Draco took a shaky step back and found himself suddenly sitting on the arm of a dustcover-swathed chair. He was rather grateful for its support, as his legs didn't seem to want to obey him. Unable to take his eyes from the _thing_, he watched in fascinated horror as it firmed and contracted into the vague shape of a man.

A hissing voice, not unlike that of Potter when he'd spoken to the snake their second year, suddenly filled Draco's head. "Come closer, boy," it sighed.

Draco was finding it difficult to breathe. "What are you?" he choked.

"Don't you recognize me?" said the shadow. It wasn't really a shadow any more, though, he realized; a faint greenish light, like the sick glow of rotting wood, was beginning to shine from it. In the play of that dim glow Draco could make out its features, and was suddenly colder than ever.

"Father?" He heard his voice crack, as if from a long way away.

"Yes," sighed the thing that had been Julian Malfoy. "Yes. I frighten you."

"Of course you do," said Draco, terror leaching his control away. "You look like a fucking Lethifold."

The shadow laughed, a nasty dry sound like leaves rattling on stone. "Come closer, then, boy. I am very weak. Your strength will make me appear as I should appear."

He shrank back against the chair. Julian Malfoy's ghost laughed again, sadly.

"I will not hurt you. I would not hurt you, Draco. That is Lucius's desire, not mine."

The voice was suddenly so sad it made his heart hurt, sharply, as if he had been wounded. He reached out a hand to the shadow, almost without knowing he was doing it, and felt his arm go numb to the shoulder with the astonishing, all-pervading coldness that he touched. Life and heat was running out of him like blood. The shadow grew lighter and lighter, the dim glow it produced became more and more bright, until finally it lit the whole room with a more healthy light than its previous green luminescence. Draco caught his breath. His father looked like Lucius...a younger Lucius...but his face held nothing of the icy reserve Lucius cultivated, nor were his eyes and mouth surrounded by the deep lines of a constant frown. He looked as Lucius might have looked at twenty-three or so, if Lucius had ever smiled.

"Better?" said Julian Malfoy, and now the voice had lost some of its reptilian quality. Draco nodded, and the ghost released his hand. He wiggled his fingers experimentally. They seemed to work, and heat came back to the frozen flesh quite quickly.

"I don't have much time," his father continued. "I'm sorry I frightened you, back there."

"No, it's all right," Draco said hurriedly. "I'm just...well, I only just learned about it all tonight."

"I know," said Julian. "Narcissa should have told you, but...I watch you, you know, you and her, and it would have gone very hard for her if she'd let you know this before. You're old enough now to keep a secret, Draco."

"But," said Draco helplessly. "What am I supposed to do? Why did Guillaume send me here tonight?"

"Because," said his father's ghost, "you haven't learned the whole story yet. I died, and Lucius married your mother in his typical greedy fashion and proceeded to try his damnedest to make you into another him. Which he has not succeeded in doing."

"Not for want of trying," said Draco sourly, aware again of the sharp pain of the new wounds on his back.

"Indeed," said Julian, quietly. "Look...I don't want to hurt you any more than you've already been hurt today, but you've got to know this, Draco. I didn't just die. I was killed."

Draco felt cold all over again. He knew suddenly what Julian was going to say, and wished he didn't.

"Lucius," he muttered, not looking at the ghost. "Lucius killed you, didn't he?"

"Yes," said his father softly. "Narcissa wanted to believe it was an accident. She almost convinced herself, for quite a while. Then Lucius began to change. He became what you know him to be today—what you, especially, know him to be. She must have realized then what was happening. By then it was too late; she was already involved in the conspiracy of silence. Draco, I was murdered fourteen years ago today."

"How did he do it?" Draco demanded. He could see Lucius happily knocking off his brother. He knew he wasn't really taking this in; he couldn't possibly be.

"He told your Voldemort that I was a traitor to the Silver Serpents."

"He's not _my_ Voldemort," Draco spat. "I want nothing to do with him."

Julian stared at him, misty grey eyes wide. "Draco," he said softly. "You have no idea how long I've wanted to hear you say that."

"Well, it's true. _Lucius_ was training me to be a Death Eater. Still is. But...Voldemort kills. I've got no problem with a bit of good old-fashioned bigotry and hate, but I'm not up for murder." Draco's head was swimming.

"Voldemort kills, indeed," said Julian seriously. "But he let Lucius do the honours with me. He laughed when he did it. He was laughing so hard he could barely get the words out, but it worked well enough."

"Was it the Killing Curse?"

"Yes, thank Merlin," said Julian. "Quick, at least. But I wasn't finished with the world. I've been here, in what used to be my study, ever since. I think my attachment to the waking world was strongest here. You used to love this room, Draco, when you were a baby."

Draco's breath was catching in his throat like a dying man's. _I can't believe this. None of it. First my mother comes up with the sudden revelation that my father's really my uncle, and she jumped straight out of her widow's weeds and into the sack with him as soon as he made an offer; and now I'm slowly getting hypothermic in the Oak Room while talking to the ghost of my real father, who was murdered by my uncle in a fit of pique fourteen years ago under the watchful eye of He-Who-Must-Not-Be...oh, screw it...Voldemort. Now we get the little flying purple elephants and the white-robed crew from St. Mungo's._

Julian was talking again. "I know this must be hard for you to take in."

"You could say that," Draco said levelly. "What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to say to Lucius? What about the rest of the world?"

Julian was silent. Draco noticed he was slowly fading away. "Don't go! I want some answers!"

"....remember...." and he was gone.

_Well, I'm hardly likely to forget this, now am I?_

The Oak Room was once more silent and empty except for Draco and his shadow. So furious and so miserable he could barely walk straight, Draco stalked out of the room and down the stairs, tapping secret panels with his wand as he passed. A corridor opened up off the second-floor foyer, leading down into darkness. _Out. Got to get out of here. Somehow it will all be better if I can just get out of this house._

He muttered the password that would release the wards on the back door, and slipped out into the summer thunderstorm, running away into the rainswept darkness of the vast parklands. Part of his mind knew he'd have to come back, have to find a way to pretend to everybody that nothing had changed; but for now, he had no choice but to blunder through the pelting rain, running away from everything he'd heard and seen, everything he didn't want to believe.


	4. That it should come to this

Disclaimer, as before: Harry Potter, all characters thereof, and all related indicia are the property of JK Rowling. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money is being made.

Sorry this is so long in coming. Hopefully updates will be more frequent from here on.

Slings and Arrows 4

Hours later, hours after the storm had died down and the rain that lashed the park had faded to a grey endless drizzle, he began to wake up. He was freezing, curled in a sodden huddle on one of the marble benches surrounding the ancient carp pond. _Must've run all the way out here last night.__ Damn._

Draco sat up, shivering, and all the things he'd seen and understood in the Oak Room came flooding back to him. For a moment he could almost believe it had been a particularly awful nightmare, but the fresh wounds on his back were already itching with the beginning of the healing process, and he knew Narcissa had really been there in his room, and really told him all she had told him.

He felt lousy. Granted, he often felt lousy these days, but not generally like this: shivery and weak, with slow flushes of chill and heat dripping through him. The wet heaviness of his velvet dressing gown felt like frozen concrete. _I should get inside. Warm up._ He felt as if he'd never be really warm again.

Heaving himself to his feet and beginning to walk back to the house he had fled in the storm, Draco turned over the more salient points of the previous night in his head. _One: Lucius is my uncle and not my father. Two: my father was murdered by Lucius. Three: my mother jumped out of Julius's bed and straight into his murderer's barely before the ink on the death certificate was dry. _He shivered violently. _God, Mother, how could you? How _could_ you?_

_ But she said he wasn't like this. Not really. Not back then._

The sick, spinning feeling of betrayal rose in him again, and for a moment he thought he might actually vomit. He had always vaguely loved his mother; she had been cold and distant, but she had never been cruel to him, not cruel as Lucius had always been. Now the word _whore_ rose in his mind as he thought of her, and he shut his eyes for a long moment.

_And how the hell am I supposed to keep this from Lucius? It's going to be harder than ever to look at him without cringing. When I thought he was my father, I could hate him in a different way; now I can only hate him and hide it. He would kill me and Mother in a heartbeat if he knew I knew his secret._

_Why did I have to find any of this out? It would have been...better...if I'd never known._

He reached the house and hurried up the back stairs. No idea what time it was; he'd only have to hope he wasn't late for lessons, because another beating on top of last night's was something he didn't feel he could deal with. Back in his room, he hurriedly changed into dry clothes and toweled his hair to mere dampness, but couldn't stop shivering; the chills seemed to be getting worse. He was lucky on the time, though: he was not yet late for breakfast.

After combing the hair back in the public-school style Lucius favoured and making an effort to rub some colour into his cheeks, he made his way down to the dining room, paused before opening the door, and made himself go inside.

Lucius was sitting in his customary place at the head of the table, _Daily Prophet_ raised. As Draco sat down and silently let the maid serve him tea, Lucius lowered the paper just enough to regard him over the edge, his silver eyes unreadable. Draco manufactured an expression of innocent unconcern. "Good morning, Father," he said.

Lucius didn't stop staring at him. "I trust last night's lesson proved instructive," he said coldly. "You must improve your manners, Draco. I was extremely disappointed in you."

"Yes, sir," said Draco, shivering. "I'm sorry, sir. I won't disappoint you again."

"See that you don't." The _Daily Prophet_ rose again, cutting off the piercing silver gaze, and Draco let himself slump a little, shaking his head as the maid offered him scrambled eggs and sausages. He took a piece of dry toast and bit into it without hunger, wondering where Narcissa was, and if Lucius had done anything to her after exercising his whipping muscles on him the night before.

He still had no idea how he was going to survive the next month. It would be bad enough when he was back at Hogwarts, trying to pretend to everyone that nothing had happened, but a whole month of living under Lucius's roof—of speaking courteously to his father's murderer and obeying his every whim—seemed an utter impossibility. God only knew how many more Death Eater soirees he would have to survive...

And that was another thing, Draco thought, swallowing with a wince; Lucius the Bloody Uncle was grooming him to become a Death Eater, and he could think of absolutely no way, save jumping out of a fourth-floor window, that he could escape it. Before last night's revelations, the prospect of becoming a Death Eater had been repulsive; now it was unthinkable. _Perhaps I could run away_, he thought wildly, and a moment later dismissed the thought. _It's not as if I'm difficult to recognize, and Voldemort's people would be more than happy to report my whereabouts to Lucius so that he could come and retrieve me...and then I very much doubt there would be anything other than Crucio and Imperius in my future. Perhaps Imperius would be an improvement; at least I'd _know_ I didn't have any choice..._

He shivered again, suddenly freezing despite the fire that crackled in the vast marble hearth, and put down the piece of toast. _If only there were someone I could talk to_, he thought. _Not that they could give me any advice—I doubt anyone could give me any advice that would be useful—but at least I wouldn't have to bear it all alone. _

At the head of the table, Lucius had apparently finished reading the _Prophet_, and set it aside, rising from his chair. He was wearing particularly complicated robes today, with slashes of velvet down the sleeves; they looked vaguely professorial. "Come, Draco. It is time to begin the day's lessons. I trust you have studied the spells I assigned?"

"Yes, sir," he said dully, getting up. He hadn't, but then again it wasn't particularly difficult magic; he'd always been quick on the uptake. Perhaps there was a chance he could get through the morning without making too many mistakes.

A small voice spoke up inside him as they went through into Lucius's vast library. _Or perhaps there's a chance you could screw up so badly that he might end it _for_ you, and none of this will matter any more..._

He pushed away the thought and took out his wand, trying to concentrate on the words of the first spell Lucius was testing him on. It wasn't easy; he had to expend more energy than he expected on the simple task of staying upright without swaying, as the floor had apparently decided it didn't want to stay flat under his feet. Draco put this down to another of Lucius's little amusements, and was determined not to show that he had noticed it. "Ready, sir," he said.

He had no idea how much time had passed when at last Lucius told him to put his wand away and have a seat at the desk; he knew only that the swaying and dipping of the floor seemed to have grown more pronounced, and that his uncle must have done something funny to the temperature of the room—it kept flicking from being uncomfortably hot to being downright freezing. _I _won't_ show weakness_, he thought. _I _won't_, no matter how happy it would make him._

"You will study and memorize the third and fourth chapters of Spurhold's _History of the Dark Arts_," said Lucius. "I will expect you to be able to answer in-depth questions regarding the subject matter in essay form. You will have completed your work by one o'clock, at which time you will be expected in the dining room for luncheon. Is that clear?"

"Yes, sir," said Draco, reaching for the book and opening it to the third chapter. Lucius swept out of the library, and he bent over the text and took out a quill to make notes, but found that it was oddly hard to focus on the printed type; the letters seemed to be moving on the page as if they were made not of ink but of small restless insects, and it made him feel sick to watch them squirm and twitch. After a few moments he sat back in the chair and wiped sweat away from his face, shivering. _Maybe he's put a hex on me or something—he's determined to have a reason to punish me._

The little voice spoke up again. _Maybe you should let him. Maybe you should let him punish you, and let it be over. All of this._

This time he paid it a little more attention. His head was aching abominably with the effort to get the letters on the page to lie still. _Maybe_, said the voice, _you should escape it on your own._

_ No_, he told the voice. _That's...well, it's just not on. _

_ Why not? It would be over so quickly, and it wouldn't have to hurt. You know enough Potions now...the stuff Snape doesn't teach the others, because they might make mistakes with it. You know ways._

_ It's not done,_ Draco told the voice. _One doesn't...take the easy way out. _

_ Why not?_ it said again. _What, after all, is stopping you? What have you got to lose?_

He wondered. What indeed? What happened after the last syllables of the curse died away, after the cup was drained, after the knife was withdrawn? What happened next, and what if it was...worse?

_Don't be stupid,_ said the voice. _How could it possibly be worse?_

He stared bleakly down at Spurhold's _History of the Dark Arts_. He'd read it before, desultorily, out of boredom; the little he could remember had held horrors that made even him swallow hard. _It could be worse_, he said. _I just don't know. And I...find that I am not quite willing to take that chance._

_ Coward,_ said the voice. He shivered, pulling his cloak tighter around his shoulder and wishing that Lucius had had the grace to take the damn temperature hex off the room. _Coward.__ You don't have the guts to do it._

_ No_, he thought, absently. _You've got it backwards. Now shut up. I have work to do._

The voice shut up, but he couldn't quite dismiss what it had said. Even as he bent over the book again, trying to ignore the chills and the dizziness and the blinding headache, even as he began to make notes in his tiny neat hand about the flowering of the Dark Arts in the fourteenth century, he couldn't quite dismiss it out of hand. He _did_ know enough ways to make sure it wouldn't hurt and that it would be quick; he could do it easily, and make sure nobody could undo it again. But what he had told the voice had been true. He didn't know what happened after death; no one really did. And it could be worse, in ways he didn't even know. It could be worse, and it could be impossible to escape.

The malachite clock on the mantel struck quarter to one, and Draco set down his quill, massaging his cramped fingers with his other hand. The headache had receded a little, and the swaying and dipping of the room around him had turned into a rather pleasant feeling of lightheadedness; however, he had begun to feel as if his robes were too tight around his chest, making it impossible to draw a deep breath. He was still shivering, and sweat had darkened his silver-blonde hair to a dull grey; he caught sight of himself in one of the antique mirrors, and was dimly amused at the clown-white face that stared back at him with brilliant eyes.

"That won't do," he said out loud, and was surprised how difficult it was to draw in a deep breath to speak. He pulled out his wand and pointed it at himself, muttering a brief glamorie; the face in the mirror was suddenly his ordinary face, the hectic flares of red on his cheekbones had faded, his eyes had lost their feverish glitter. He glowered at himself, and the face glowered back; it was good enough to be convincing.

Narcissa was there when he returned to the dining room, and he had to push away a sudden surge of disgust when he saw her. She didn't look particularly well herself; she hadn't bothered with concealer on the circles under her eyes, and her hair was scraped back in a simple knot instead of teased and plaited and pinned into some complicated sculptural arrangement. She was wearing high-collared robes. For a moment Draco thought again of what her back must look like, criscrossed with silvery scars like his own, and the thought woke the pain of his own healing wounds.

"Hello, Draco," she said.

He sketched a little half-bow. "Good afternoon, Mother," he said, and took the seat she indicated. She looked as if she was about to say something else, but just then Lucius swept into the room, his elfin face alight with pleasure and malice. Draco reflected dizzily that the one looked very much like the other, at least on that particular set of features.

Both Narcissa and Draco rose, as they had been taught, and he waved them back into their seats as he took his own at the head of the table.

"I've had good news," he said, snapping his fingers for the servants to bring in the food. "Delightful news, in fact."

Narcissa smiled. "I'm glad," she said. "What has happened?"

"The Dark Lord has founded a new stronghold in Romania. I have been summoned to assist him at once; I'm leaving immediately after luncheon."

Draco managed, by dint of considerable effort, to keep both the glamorie and the look of slightly awed disappointment on his face. Through the lightheadedness he could tell that Narcissa, too, was having some difficulty looking unhappy. "That's wonderful, my love," she was saying. "Such an opportunity. How...how long will we be missing you?"

"Oh, a few days only," said Lucius breezily. "How could I stay away from my family, when Draco is showing such potential?" He chuckled, a nasty mirthless noise, and Draco was sure he knew exactly how they both felt about the prospect of his absence. Lucius nodded to the footman to pour the wine.

"Of course the Dark Lord's will is paramount," murmured Narcissa, eyes downcast, "but I shall be sorry to have you leave us."

Lucius reached out and patted her hand. "There, there, my dear. It's only a few days. I'll bring you back something lovely from Hunedoara."

Narcissa gave him a misty smile. Draco began to feel sick again, and concentrated on keeping the glamorie intact; he didn't want to think about what Lucius would do to him if his actual condition were revealed. The tightness in his chest was beginning to worry him; it hurt to draw a deep breath now, hurt somewhere deep inside him. He was used to pain, of course; had been used to pain for years now, but this was a bit disconcerting. If only his head would stop spinning...

He realized Lucius had said something to him. "I'm sorry, sir," he said. "I was thinking about Dr. Spurhold's book."

A flicker of annoyance crossed Lucius's lovely features and was gone. "I'm glad to see you are so focused on your studies, Draco," he said, without inflection. "I was saying that I had left you a syllabus to work on in my absence. I expect you to be able to perform all the spells I listed as well as pass a written exam on the theory by the time I return."

"Of course, sir." Draco straightened up with an effort and manufactured an expression of studious interest. Lucius held his gaze a little longer, then nodded curtly, and raised his glass in a toast.

"To the Dark Lord, and his imminent victory," he said.

Narcissa and Draco raised their own glasses and repeated the toast in a chorus. For a moment Draco saw something of his father in Lucius; there was real pleasure there, for a moment, and it changed his face; his eyes lost their glacial mirrorlike quality, a smile curved his lips without the ever-present hint of mockery. He looked as Julius might have looked, for just that moment—a moment in which he was thinking of horrors that made Draco shiver.

Somehow he made it through the meal, although swallowing was hard when he had to concentrate on breathing, and he certainly had no appetite for the food. Oddly enough, the wine—this time a claret, one of the real jewels of Lucius's cellar—seemed to help a little; perhaps he was finally getting used to it. He finished the glass, anyway, and it did not make the dizziness worse.

Lucius rose, and they rose with him. "I must be on my way," he was saying. Draco felt the glamorie begin to fade, and willed more power into it. _Just let it hold until he's gone. Just that long. Just let me get up to my room and go to sleep for a few hours, and I'll feel better...I have to feel better. _

He watched Lucius take Narcissa in his arms, kiss her. His jaw tightened, but he managed not to lose his expression of vague regret. Lucius let her go and turned to him, and he was extraordinarily grateful that no fatherly embrace seemed forthcoming; he merely nodded to Draco, turned on his heel, and left.

Narcissa stood there as he had left her, head slightly bowed, until his footsteps had died away completely; then she turned to her son. Her violet-blue eyes widened.

"Draco—" she said, but he didn't hear the rest of the sentence; the room gave a sudden great heave and tipped him off his feet, and he seemed to take an age to fall, with her voice fading very far away and faint. The dizziness and the flaring heat and chill and the steel bands around his chest all faded away, and he went on falling into blackness, and it closed over his head.


	5. Chapter 5

DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter, its characters, and related indicia belong to JK Rowling and possibly Warner Bros. No copyright infringement is intended. No money is being made. I also have no claim on the chunks of text from Mervyn Peake's _Titus Alone_ quoted heavily in the first section of this instalment: it happens to be one of my very, very favourite delirious monologues evar and it applies neatly to this situation. Finally: thank everyone who has reviewed and urged me to carry on with this. I'm going to.

I also don't know why it won't let me keep doublespaces around the horizontal lines. Sorry if it's hard to read. It apparently doesn't like the idea of spaces. Yes, I have tried using the source code. No, it does not do a damned thing. It would be nice if this were fixable.

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* * *

"_Can you hear me….O can you hear me…Can you…?"_

"_Is that my son? Where are you….child?"_

"_Where are you, mother?"_

"_Where I always am."_

"_At your high window, mother, a-swarm with birds?"_

"_Where else?"_

"_Can no one tell me…?"_

"_Tell you what?"_

"_Where in the world I am…"_

"_Not easily…..not easily." _

"_You were never easy with your sums, young man. Never."_

He was curled in on himself somewhere, a long way away from anything close to home. Curled tightly enough to make the clawing agony in his chest mute and fade itself to dim unhappiness: curled tightly enough to press his face against his knees, a wall to stop his head from bursting.

"Why did you…" 

"_Why….why….?"_

"_Listen…..listen…."_

"_The birds are perched upon her head like leaves."_

"_And the cats like a white tide?"_

"_The cats are loyal in a traitors' world."_

He had long ago given up on surfacing from this dark lake. Like the maimed Grendel he had sunk and sunk and sunk below black waters and could not now even see the flickering spiderweb of light filtering from the surface. All was dark, all quiet. Except for the voices still crying in his head, no longer raking their claws and shrieking: almost mournful.

"_He saved my life. He saved it many times._

"_Cut out the woman in you with a jack-knife. God save the sweetness of your iron heart."_

He floated on the face of the waters. Dimly, a very long way away, he was conscious of pain and of urgency, people somewhere fighting for something he didn't understand, didn't care to. It was not his problem, any more.

And then a new voice, in the darkness.

"_Draco,"_ it said. And it was not crying out, not moaning or shrieking or whimpering: it was a man's voice, calm and warm and strong. _"Draco. Listen to me, son. You must come back to her. She needs you; you are all of me she has left. Do not leave her as I did. I had no choice, and you do."_

He made a wordless little sound of negation, and curled tighter into himself, aware that he was a hypercube, that he was a nautilus curled into itself in sixteen dimensions, that imaginary numbers were real and were the only way to describe the cosmos, that Markant's Constant was true, that the quantum thaumic dances of the microstrings were the only basis for the universe.

"_Draco,"_ said the voice implacably. _"Draco."_

"What?" he snapped. "What do you want? Go away. I'm in the Desmarais cloud, I'm seeing numbers. Go away."

"_You're not, you know. You're dying."_

That roused him a little. "No I'm not. I'd know."

"You're dying. She has the local thaumedician in and he is too frightened to try and move you to a hospital, my son. You're dying. Don't do it."

"I'm_not_ dying." Draco uncurled a little further and waved away the neutron clouds. All around him topological wonders rippled and inverted. "I'm not."

"_That's the spirit, boy."_ He knew the voice. He did. He'd heard it before, in the Oak Chamber, in a nightmare.

"……Father?"

"Took you long enough. Now. Listen, Draco. Listen well. There are things you must do, with this knowledge. I know it tortures you. I know it well. You must take it and make it into deed, and you must stop him, Draco, no matter what the cost. He has taken too many lives already, and I will not have him steal yours as well."

That brought him up short. "'ve just got, got a cold or something. Not dying."

"_Shut up,"_ said his dead father, _"or I will give you a thumping your astral eye won't forget in a hurry. Now see me. See me very well."_

And Draco did. Out of the darkness of the intricate web of numbers he found himself hurtling through interstellar space, black, empty, cold, void, and just as suddenly face to face with Julius Malfoy. Just as in the Oak Chamber he could recognize that face. Anywhere.

"…Father, what…?"

"There's no time. I can give you a little strength to heal. A little. But you must find the rest yourself, Draco, and I _know_ you can do that. You have always survived despite all the odds. You will not fail now. _Heed me._"

Julius reached out insubstantial hands and took Draco's face between them. His father's touch was so cold it shocked him entirely into being, into real awareness. He knew he hurt. He knew somewhere in another world ice was being packed around him, needles shoved into his veins. More than that, though: through the touch of his father's hands he knew exactly what it was he was to do, and how to do it, and how Lucius would react.

Despite the chill and the echoing pain from wherever reality currently located itself he found himself grinning. Lucius would have recognized that grin. It meant _I am about to do something entirely, entirely unforgivable._

* * *

* * *

* * *

Waking up was like waking to a burial alive. Draco arched spasmodically on the bed and tore in a long, deep, shrieking gasp of air that set his chest on fire; his throat closed, red-hot bands around his ribs tightened unmercifully, he choked as if the fresh air of the bedroom was vulcanic smoke. Hands came out of the ether and supported him, someone had an arm around his shoulders, someone held him steady, held his head, as he hacked desperately for breath and tasted hot copper. It seemed to go on forever; he wasn't sure how many years had gone by when the spasms of choking let him go, and he collapsed back into the someone's arms and listened to the high thin whistle of his own breathing. 

They were talking. People were talking. Someone wiped his face with a cold cloth and it felt so wonderful that he turned his head to follow the touch, blindly groping for that coldness: and then there was a trickle of water-clear absolution in his mouth, and ice chips, and he sucked greedily and found that despite everything his throat _would_ let him swallow.

More distant talking. And the cold touch moved down to his burning chest, and oh, that made everything hurt less; and he found himself drifting like a loosed balloon, up, out, away.

When he found himself back in the prison of his body again he opened his eyes and grunted at the pain of light spearing into his skull. Someone close by shifted, and there was a rustle of heavy cloth, and the light cut off abruptly.

"Back with us," said a voice.

"..Mother?" He told his eyes sternly that they were to obey him, and focus. Narcissa drifted out of greyness, haggard and yellow, her hair loose in a waterfall of platinum over her shoulders. She looked ten years older. Had he really been away so long?

"Hush," she said. And smiled a little, and about six of those years fell away. "Hush, love. You've been very ill, but you're on the mend now. Do you think you could drink something cold, for me? It's bitter but it will help you."

His throat felt like the inside of a chimney. "Please?"

Narcissa nodded, and turned out of his limited field of blurry vision; and came back again with a glass sweating with cold. Her thin hand—was his mother always so warm to the touch?—slipped behind his shoulders, and she lifted him and held the glass while he drank greedily. It was bitter, bitter as aloes, as ashes, but he didn't care: it was wet.

"There's my brave son." Narcissa let him lie back. "You've been ill for almost a week, dearling. Your…father…is unavoidably detained, but he will be home as soon as he can."

Perhaps only she and he understood what that tone of desperate concern meant. Certainly he felt himself flicking automatically into calculating options and potential risks and benefits. Narcissa must have seen some of that in his eyes: she stroked his damp hair away from his face with a slightly-shaking hand.

"Please," she said. "Draco. Don't worry about anything at all but getting better. That's all, love. We just want you well and strong."

_Too late by half,_ he thought sourly; but merely nodded with a drowsy blink. "'s…he coming back before time…? The Dark Lord won't be happy."

"I don't know," Narcissa told him. "That's between him and the Dark Lord, Draco. Not my business to ask."

He had to laugh at that, and laughing caught like broken glass in his chest and he curled up and black and scarlet flowers bloomed in his vision. When the cough let go it was a little while before he could breathe steadily enough to try a croak.

"…want….want to, to celebrate his return. His, his promotion. Put on a celebration, Mother. Feast and banquet and singing of praises. I want to do a play."

"A play?" Narcissa parroted. "A…are you sure, Draco? You've…you're not…"

"I'll be better soon. You said. I want to do a play." It hadn't been so very long ago that Lucius had enjoyed his little tableaux: _Scenes from the Life of Francois Valigny du Malfoy, _ for example. _The Archwizard Hieronyme du Malfoi At Ease._ "Please, Mother. I, I want to show him my respect."

He wondered vaguely just how long it took for liars to get used enough to lying to believe their own selves.

"Well. We'll see." He knew very well that meant "yes," but just nodded and lay back against his pillows. Narcissa dabbed at his face with a handkerchief.

"Rest, Draco. You're out of danger. Just rest."

He let himself nod, and let go of his stranglehold on consciousness, and felt it falling away from him like the surface of a dark lake. He did have time before he hit the bottom to think that if Lucius decided to kill him after all he might very well take it as a kindness.


End file.
